Chargers' QB issue remains up in the air

SAN DIEGO -- Let the sports radio blather pick up where it left
off. Let the water-cooler debates recommence. The waiting game
continues at Chargers Park.

As he had Monday, coach Marty Schottenheimer again declined
Wednesday to name a starting quarterback for this weekend's game
against Minnesota, preferring to force the Vikings to prepare for
both Drew Brees and Doug Flutie.

"I'll be prepared to make the announcement tomorrow,"
Schottenheimer said. "It's purely a competitive thing. It makes no
sense from a competitive standpoint to make a decision now and give
the opponent the opportunity to say, 'Well, this is where they're
gonna go, now this is the plan we should implement.' "

Schottenheimer met with Brees and Flutie on Wednesday, but both
quarterbacks denied that he notified them who will start Sunday's
game.

"What have I been told?" Flutie said, repeating a question posed
to him. "That we will make an announcement later in the week, and
until then we're both going to get work and go from there. So I
guess I'm one step ahead of where I was a couple weeks ago."

It was suggested that Flutie received more snaps in Wednesday's
practice, which would indicate that he is being prepared for the
starting role. But Schottenheimer and Flutie both said they weren't
counting reps, while Brees and several other players insisted that
the workload evened out during the course of the session.

Flutie had his throwing elbow wrapped in ice after practice,
another possible sign that he saw more action than Brees, whose arm
hung free. But, alas, Flutie said he also iced his elbow twice last
week leading up to Sunday's 20-7 loss to Chicago, in which the
41-year-old quarterback relieved an ineffective Brees and sparked
the team in the fourth quarter.

In essence, even Sherlock Holmes -- much less feebleminded
reporters -- couldn't have gotten to the bottom of this mystery.
And that's just how Schottenheimer wanted it. The coach, smiling
throughout, appeared to take glee in the cat-and-mouse game he
played with the assembled media.

"I was going to say I'm not being evasive, but I am," he said at
one point. "I understand the interest that everybody has, and it's
certainly with good reason. However, it doesn't really benefit the
Chargers in any way to make that announcement right now."

Schottenheimer's thinking is that the Chargers' quarterbacks are
different enough -- Brees a traditional pocket passer, Flutie a
more mobile player with a proclivity to scramble -- that it hinders
an opponent's ability to prepare similarly for either, a point
supported by Flutie.

"From talking to other defensive coordinators, they put in a
different plan for me when I play," he said. "They really do. Bill
Belichick, I used to talk to him a lot. They do things differently
if I'm going to play or if the other guy's going to play."

With the uncertainty surrounding who will start, Vikings coach
Mike Tice said his approach will be to simply get his team ready to
face a physical opponent that, first and foremost, likes to run the
football.